1700-1799: New graphic forms

The 18th century witnessed, and participated in, the initial germination of the seeds of visualization which had been planted earlier. Map-makers began to try to show more than just geographical position on a map. As a results, new graphic forms (isolines and contours) were invented, and thematic mapping of physical quantities took root. Towards the end of this century, we see the first attempts at the thematic mapping of geologic, economic, and medical data.

Abstract graphs, and graphs of functions were introduced, along with the early beginnings of statistical theory (measurement error) and systematic collection of empirical data. As other (economic and political) data began to be collected, some novel visual forms were invented to portray them, so the data could "speak to the eyes".

As well, several technological innovations provided necessary nutrients. These facilitated the reproduction of data images (color printing, lithography), and other developments eased the task of creating them. Yet, most of these new graphic forms appeared in publications with limited circulation, unlikely to attract wide attention.

Geomagnetism: early concept of the North Magnetic PoleThe concept of the North Magnetic Pole arose from the desire of early European navigators to explain the directional properties of the compass. Chines used compass at least as early as the 1st century and it was imported to Europe in the 12th century.

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First test of statistical significance based on deviation between observed data and a null hypothesis (used to show that the guiding hand of a devine being could be discerned in the nearly constant ratio of male to female births in London over 1629--1710)

The normal distribution was first introduced by de Moivre in an article in 1733 (reprinted in the second edition of his The Doctrine of Chances, 1738). Laplacelater extended this in his book Analytical Theory of Probabilities.A further generalization, to the central limit theorem occurred later.

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Development of the use of polar coordinates for the representation of functions. Newton's Method of Fluxions was written about 1671, but not published until 1736. Jacob Bernoulli published a derivation of the idea in 1691 attributes the development of polar coordinates to Fontana, with no date.

1671 is probably too early; 1736--1755 would probably be more appropriate. There are earlier references to Hipparchus (190-120BC) regarding the use of polar coordinates in establishing stellar positions, and Abu Arrayhan Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Biruni (1021) regarding the use of three rectangular coordinates to establish a point in space.

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Beginnings of the estimation of $m$ unknown quantities from $n$ emipirical equations (where $n > m$), taking account of the possibility of errors in the observations (later supplanted by the method of least squares)

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Diagrams developed to represent color systems. In 1758, Mayer developed a system of constructing and naming many of the possible colours. Lambert extended this with a 3D pyramid indicating "depth'' (saturation).

Lambert wanted to extend the coverage of the system to include the concept of depth. He believed that the colour pyramid would be useful to textile merchants to decide if they stocked all the colours, and to dyers and printers as a source of inspiration.

Monge's work, Descriptive geometry, was the first consciously formulated exposition of the science of orthographic projection and descriptive geometry. Sylvestre Lacriux discovered the principles of projection independently about the same time as Monge. Jean Pierre Hackette added new material to Monge's descriptive geometry and published a book on this subject in 1822.

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Invention of lithographic technique for printing of maps and diagrams ("At the time the effect of lithography ... was as great as has been the introduction [of the Xerox machine]'' cite[p. 57]{Robinson:1982}) (published in several translations, 1818--19)

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This web version is dedicated to Arthur H. Robinson (1915-2004), who inspired and encouraged our interest; to Antoine de Falguerolles, who initiated it, and to les Chevaliers des Album de Statistique Graphique, who supported it with interest, enthusiasm, and resources. In particular, Gilles Palsky, Antoine de Falguerolles, Antony Unwin and Ruddy Ostermann contributed important images and background information. This work is supported by the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Grant OGP0138748.

Citations: References to information or images obtained from this web site should be cited as follows:
Friendly, M. & Denis, D. J. (2001).
Milestones in the history of thematic cartography, statistical graphics, and data visualization.
Web document, http://www.datavis.ca/milestones/. Accessed: